Source text - EnglishBarack Obama was raised by a single mother and his grandparents. They didn't have much money, but they taught him values from the Kansas heartland where they grew up. He took out loans to put himself through school. After college, he worked for Christian churches in Chicago, helping communities devastated when steel plants closed. Obama turned down lucrative job offers after law school to return to Chicago, leading a successful voter registration drive. He joined a small law ﬁrm, taught constitutional law and, guided by his Christian faith, stayed active in his community. Obama and his wife Michelle are proud parents of two daughters, Sasha and Malia.

Early Years

Barack Obama was born in Hawaii on August 4th, 1961. His father, Barack Obama Sr., was born and raised in a small village in Kenya, where he grew up herding goats with his own father, who was a domestic servant to the British.

Barack's mother, Ann Dunham, grew up in small-town Kansas. Her father worked on oil rigs during the Depression, and then signed up for World War II after Pearl Harbor, where he marched across Europe in Patton's army. Her mother went to work on a bomber assembly line, and after the war, they studied on the G.I. Bill, bought a house through the Federal Housing Program, and moved west to Hawaii.

It was there, at the University of Hawaii, where Barack's parents met. His mother was a student there, and his father had won a scholarship that allowed him to leave Kenya and pursue his dreams in America.

Barack's father eventually returned to Kenya, and Barack grew up with his mother in Hawaii, and for a few years in Indonesia. Later, he moved to New York, where he graduated from Columbia University in 1983.

The College Years

Remembering the values of empathy and service that his mother taught him, Barack put law school and corporate life on hold after college and moved to Chicago in 1985, where he became a community organizer with a church-based group seeking to improve living conditions in poor neighborhoods plagued with crime and high unemployment.

The group had some success, but Barack had come to realize that in order to truly improve the lives of people in that community and other communities, it would take not just a change at the local level, but a change in our laws and in our politics.

He went on to earn his law degree from Harvard in 1991, where he became the first African-American president of the Harvard Law Review. Soon after, he returned to Chicago to practice as a civil rights lawyer and teach constitutional law. Finally, his advocacy work led him to run for the Illinois State Senate, where he served for eight years. In 2004, he became the third African American since Reconstruction to be elected to the U.S. Senate.

Political Career

It has been the rich and varied experiences of Barack Obama's life -- growing up in different places with people who had differing ideas -- that have animated his political journey. Amid the partisanship and bickering of today's public debate, he still believes in the ability to unite people around a politics of purpose -- a politics that puts solving the challenges of everyday Americans ahead of partisan calculation and political gain.

In the Illinois State Senate, this meant working with both Democrats and Republicans to help working families get ahead by creating programs like the state Earned Income Tax Credit, which in three years provided over $100 million in tax cuts to families across the state. He also pushed through an expansion of early childhood education, and after a number of inmates on death row were found innocent, Obama worked with law enforcement officials to require the videotaping of interrogations and confessions in all capital cases.

In the U.S. Senate, he focused on tackling the challenges of a globalized, 21st century world with fresh thinking and a politics that no longer settles for the lowest common denominator. His first law was passed with Republican Tom Coburn, a measure to rebuild trust in government by allowing every American to go online and see how and where every dime of their tax dollars is spent. He has been the lead voice in championing ethics reform that would root out Jack Abramoff-style corruption in Congress.

As a member of the Veterans' Affairs Committee, Obama fought to help veterans get the disability pay they were promised, while working to prepare the VA for the thousands of veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan. Recognizing the terrorist threat posed by weapons of mass destruction, he traveled to Russia with Republican Dick Lugar to begin a new generation of non-proliferation efforts designed to find and secure deadly weapons around the world. And knowing the threat we face to our economy and our security from America's addiction to oil, he worked to bring auto companies, unions, farmers, businesses, and politicians of both parties together to promote the greater use of alternative fuels and higher fuel standards in our cars.

Whether it's the poverty exposed by Katrina, the genocide in Darfur, or the role of faith in our politics, Barack Obama continues to speak out on the issues that will define America in the 21st century. But above all his accomplishments and experiences, he is most proud and grateful for his family. His wife, Michelle, and his two daughters, Malia, 10, and Sasha, 7, live on Chicago's South Side.

Source text - EnglishJoe Biden is a rare mix. A leader who has worked for decades in Washington, but has never lived there. An expert on foreign policy, whose heart and values are firmly rooted in the middle class. He has stared down dictators, and spoken for America's cops and firefighters. He is uniquely suited to serve as Barack Obama’s partner in the urgent mission to bring about the change America needs to put our country back on track.

Biography

Joseph Robinette Biden Jr., age 66, was born in Scranton, Pennsylvania, on November 20, 1942, to Joseph Sr. and Jean Biden, the oldest of four. In 1953, the Biden family moved from Pennsylvania to Claymont, Delaware. Biden attended parochial school at St. Helena’s School in Wilmington and the Archmere Academy in Claymont. Public service has always been an important part of Biden family life -- one of Joe's great grandfathers served as a Pennsylvania state senator.

After graduating from the University of Delaware in 1965 and from law school at Syracuse University in 1968, Biden moved back to the Wilmington area and set up his own law firm. He practiced law until 1972.

In 1970, Biden -- at age 27 -- ran for New Castle County Council and won in a Republican district. At age 29, he launched an improbable bid to unseat two-term Republican U.S. Sen. J. Caleb Boggs. With very little help from the state establishment, and with his sister as his campaign manager, Biden defeated Boggs by 3,162 votes.

Just weeks after the election, Biden's wife, Neilia, and their 1-year-old daughter, Naomi, were killed and their two young sons critically injured in an auto accident. Biden was sworn in at his sons' hospital bedside and began commuting to Washington every day by train, a practice he has maintained throughout his career in the Senate.

In 1977, Biden married Jill Jacobs. Jill Biden, who holds an Ed.D., has been an educator for over two decades in Delaware's schools. Currently she is a professor at Delaware Technical Community College.

Vice President-Elect Biden has three children: Beau, Hunter, and Ashley. Beau currently serves as Delaware's Attorney General -- and as a captain in the 261st Signal Brigade of the Delaware National Guard. Ashley is a social worker and Hunter is an attorney. Vice President-Elect Biden also has five grandchildren: Naomi, Finnegan, Roberta Mabel, Natalie, and Robert Hunter.

In 1988, Biden suffered a cranial aneurysm and nearly died. He recovered by early 1989 after two surgeries and has enjoyed good health since then.

In addition to serving as U.S. Senator, Biden has been an adjunct professor at the Widener University School of Law since 1991, where he teaches a seminar on constitutional law.

Key Career Accomplishments

Biden became ranking Democrat on the Foreign Relations Committee in 1997 and served as chairman of the committee from 2001 to 2003 and from 2007 to the present. He served as chairman or ranking member of the Judiciary Committee for sixteen years. He is recognized as one of the nation's leading authorities on foreign policy, as well as one of its most influential voices on terrorism, drug policy, crime, and issues important to women. He has been a tireless advocate for working families and has reached across the aisle to work with Republicans on tackling some of the greatest challenges facing Americans.

* Like Barack Obama, Biden has been an outspoken critic of George W. Bush's handling of the war in Iraq.
* Biden's leadership was instrumental in helping to bring stability and peace to the Balkans. In 1999, Biden wrote a resolution endorsing the air war in Kosovo that was passed by the Senate.
* Biden has been a leader of the congressional effort to end genocide in Darfur.
* In the late 1990s, Biden led the effort in the Senate to bring Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic into NATO and to pass the Chemical Weapons Treaty.
* Biden has been instrumental in crafting almost every major piece of crime legislation over the past two decades. His Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994 put more than 100,000 police officers on America's streets and has been credited with bringing crime rates down to the lowest point in a generation.
* In 1996, Biden authored legislation to create a national registry of sex offenders, which tracks people convicted of sex crimes involving violence or committed against minors.
* Biden authored and passed the landmark Violence Against Women Act, the strongest legislation to date that criminalizes domestic violence and holds batterers accountable.
* Biden was a strong supporter of the Family and Medical Leave Act, cracked down on deadbeat dads, and has been a consistent champion for equal pay.
* Biden was one of the first to introduce legislation to address global warming and he co-sponsored the most aggressive pieces of climate change legislation in the U.S. Senate.
* Biden is a champion on the issue of making college more affordable by using the tax code to reduce costs.
* Biden was successful in passing a provision that prevents budget cuts to military facilities while the nation is at war, an effort that shored up one of his key priorities -- top-notch medical treatment for all veterans in a fully-funded VA health care system.

Vice President-Elect Biden has a proven record of bringing people together to get things done. From global warming to combating violence against women to confronting the challenges of the dangerous world in which we live, Joe Biden has fought every day over the course of his life in public service to improve the lives of middle class families.

Source text - EnglishJoseph Robinette Biden, Jr., was born November 20, 1942, in Scranton, Pennsylvania, the first of four siblings. In 1953, the Biden family moved from Pennsylvania to Claymont, Delaware. He graduated from the University of Delaware and Syracuse Law School and served on the New Castle County Council. Then, at age 29, he became one of the youngest people ever elected to the United States Senate.

Just weeks after the election, tragedy struck the Biden family, when Biden's wife, Neilia, and their 1-year old daughter, Naomi, were killed and their two young sons critically injured in an auto accident. Biden was sworn in at his sons' hospital bedside and began commuting to Washington every day by train, a practice he maintained throughout his career in the Senate.

In 1977, Biden married Jill Jacobs. Jill Biden, who holds a Ph.D. in Education, has been an educator for over two decades in Delaware's schools. Vice President Biden has three children: Beau, Hunter, and Ashley. Beau serves as Delaware's Attorney General and is currently deployed to Iraq as a Captain in the 261st Signal Brigade of the Delaware National Guard. Ashley is a social worker and Hunter is an attorney. Vice President Biden has five grandchildren: Naomi, Finnegan, Roberta Mabel ("Maisy"), Natalie, and Robert Hunter.

As a Senator from Delaware for 36 years, Biden has been a leader on some of our nation's most important domestic and international challenges. As Chairman or Ranking Member of the Senate Judiciary Committee for 17 years, Biden was widely recognized for his work on criminal justice issues including the landmark 1994 Crime Bill and the Violence Against Women Act. As Chairman or Ranking Member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee since 1997, Biden played a pivotal role in shaping U.S. foreign policy. He has been at the forefront of issues and legislation related to terrorism, weapons of mass destruction, post-Cold War Europe, the Middle East, and Southwest Asia.

Source text - EnglishBarack H. Obama is the 44th President of the United States.

His story is the American story — values from the heartland, a middle-class upbringing in a strong family, hard work and education as the means of getting ahead, and the conviction that a life so blessed should be lived in service to others.

With a father from Kenya and a mother from Kansas, President Obama was born in Hawaii on August 4, 1961. He was raised with help from his grandfather, who served in Patton's army, and his grandmother, who worked her way up from the secretarial pool to middle management at a bank.

After working his way through college with the help of scholarships and student loans, President Obama moved to Chicago, where he worked with a group of churches to help rebuild communities devastated by the closure of local steel plants.

He went on to attend law school, where he became the first African-American president of the Harvard Law Review. Upon graduation, he returned to Chicago to help lead a voter registration drive, teach constitutional law at the University of Chicago, and remain active in his community.

President Obama's years of public service are based around his unwavering belief in the ability to unite people around a politics of purpose. In the Illinois State Senate, he passed the first major ethics reform in 25 years, cut taxes for working families, and expanded health care for children and their parents. As a United States Senator, he reached across the aisle to pass groundbreaking lobbying reform, lock up the world's most dangerous weapons, and bring transparency to government by putting federal spending online.

He was elected the 44th President of the United States on November 4, 2008, and sworn in on January 20, 2009. He and his wife, Michelle, are the proud parents of two daughters, Malia, 10, and Sasha, 7.